WND Scoops 2008

WND was the first news organization to blow the whistle on Sen. Barack Obama’s plan for a “civilian national security force,” which the presidential candidate asserted in a speech would be “just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded” as the half-trillion dollar Army, Marines, Navy and Air Force.

Joseph Farah, founder and editor of WND, used his daily column first to raise the issue of the secret $439 billion plan, and then to elevate it with a call to all reporters to start asking questions about it. After Farah reported the statement, it was picked up by many other news organizations and became the subject of intense discussions on the Internet.

In an interview that made world headlines and became a major theme in the 2008 presidential campaign, Ahmed Yousuf, Hamas’ top political adviser in the Gaza Strip, told WND’s Aaron Klein he “hopes” Obama becomes president and he compared the Illinois senator to John F. Kennedy.

WND quoted Israeli security officials expressing concern about Robert Malley, an ancillary adviser to Sen. Barack Obama who has advocated negotiations with Hamas and providing international assistance to the terrorist group. One month later, Malley resigned from Obama’s campaign amid reports he held talks with Hamas.

Sen. Barack Obama’s controversial Chicago church reprinted a manifesto by Hamas that defended terrorism as legitimate resistance, refused to recognize the right of Israel to exist and compared the terror group’s official charter – which calls for the murder of Jews – to America’s Declaration of Independence.

Following the controversy surrounding his former spiritual adviser Rev. Jeremiah Wright, WND reported Sen. Barack Obama has been linked to another controversial pastor, this time a declared spiritual adviser – James Meeks – who has called white American mayors “slave masters,” and referred to black preachers and politicians who “protect” the “white man” as “house n-ggers.”

Merrill A. McPeak, Sen. Barack Obama’s military adviser and national campaign co-chairman, implied U.S. politicians are afraid of Jewish voters in Miami and New York City and that American Jews are the “problem” impeding a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. McPeak, a former Air Force chief of staff, also compared the Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist organizations to what he described as religious radicals in Oregon and claimed “born-again [Christians]” supported the war in Iraq to help Israel.

In his autobiographical book “Dreams from My Father,” Barack Obama paints a heroic picture of his father as having emerged from a poor Kenyan village, where he was nothing more than a simple goat herder, to become a Harvard-educated economist, destined to return to Africa to fulfill his promise.

In a widely-referenced article, WND reported Ottis Moss, the new pastor at the Trinity United Church of Christ, has called blacks “lepers” with a “skin disease,” claimed U.S. entertainment corporations operate with “disdain” for black people, and in a fiery sermon claimed retired pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright was “lynched” by the media and compared the embattled pastor to Jesus. Moss, by Obama as a “wonderful young pastor,” also refused to deny claims by Wright that the U.S. government was involved in distributing illegal drugs to minorities or spreading the AIDS virus to blacks.

WND then reported Moss referenced a rap song during one of his recent sermons that includes among its lyrics “F— America” and states the U.S. is “still with triple K” – referring to the white supremacist Ku Klux Klan.

Issues of Wright’s Trumpet magazine reportedly have suggested America was guilty of genocide in Africa, decried the Fourth of July as the “national holiday of the dominant culture,” referred to America as a “diaspora” for blacks, repudiated American patriotism and entertained suggestions the Bush administration knew about the 9-11 attacks before they were carried out.

WND was first to bring national attention to Obama supporter Father Michael Pfleger, a white Roman Catholic priest of a mostly black church in Chicago who has links to Nation of Islam chief Louis Farrakhan and an apparently low level of tolerance for the 2nd Amendment.

Before the national media grabbed the story, WND was the first to report Chicago Catholic pastor Michael Pfleger, a declared close associate and spiritual adviser of Sen. Barack Obama, said in a sermon at Obama’s former church that Sen. Hillary Clinton cried in public because she thought being white entitled her to the Democratic presidential nomination. Pfleger implied Clinton was a white supremacist who believed she would win the nomination because of “white entitlement.”

The next day, WND exclusively revealed David Axelrod, Sen. Barack Obama’s chief political strategist, sits on the finance committee of the Chicago church led by controversial pastor Michael Pfleger.

The Internet posting of a photograph of Democratic presidential primary frontrunner Sen. Barack Obama in what has been described as “Muslim” clothing during a visit to Kenya has drawn the typical political accusations and denials. But it’s also raised questions about Obama’s links to Kenya, which has Muslim neighbors on several fronts, and was home to Obama’s father.

“Is this a messianic movement? A cult of personality? Or just good ol’ fashioned politics?” Those are the questions an Internet blog called “Is Barack Obama the Messiah?” began with one year ago. By simply highlighting media reports since then – including WND’s account of an Obama rally in Seattle – the website has captured the wave of euphoria that has followed the Democratic senator’s remarkable rise to the brink of the party’s presidential nomination.

The creator of that satirical blog that asks whether Barack Obama is the “messiah” says he has a serious purpose, hoping the mainstream media will “work through its childish infatuation” with the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination.

When the topic of end-of-term presidential pardons is raised – of who’s most deserving of the outgoing chief executive’s compassion and mercy – there’s one case that leaps instantly to mind: that of Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean. The two imprisoned U.S. Border Patrol agents are at the center of a case that has inspired near-universal outrage and passion among Americans, including numerous U.S. congressmen who staunchly defend the men. WND led the investigation into the high-profile prosecutions and convictions of the two border cops, who received 11- and 12-year sentences for slightly wounding an illegal alien drug smuggler with a gunshot while in pursuit and in the line of duty.

While another year passes without a presidential pardon for Jose Compean and Ignacio Ramos, the families are reaching out for an 11th-hour act of compassion. Jose Compean’s wife, Patty, told WND she would like to have a heart-to-heart moment with the president.

WND was first to report on the food shortages sweeping the globe. From India to Africa to North Korea to Pakistan and even in New York City, higher grain prices, fertilizer shortages and rising energy costs are combining to spell hunger for millions in what is being characterized as a global “silent famine.”

In February, WND quoted Jordanian and Israeli security officials stating Syria, aided by Russia and Iran, in recent months had been furiously acquiring rockets and missiles, including projectiles capable of hitting the entire state of Israel. Several weeks after the WND report, Israel’s Shin Bet Security Services released the same information to the Knesset.

WND first reported a new elite, U.S.-trained and financed police unit of the Palestinian Authority was failing to fight terrorism and was running scared from their missions. Weeks later, the same story was reported by the Jerusalem Post and Israel’s leading daily, Yediot Aharonot.

In January, a new, cutting-edge, political TV show challenged Islam with biting humor, placing the face of the prophet Muhammad onto a cookie and then having it eaten on camera. The same day, WND broke the story of how the show was being censored by a national television network.

Internet giant Google again came under fire for its apparent snub of Memorial Day, but the company’s biggest competition, Yahoo, displayed a holiday-oriented logo featuring military dog tags and a purple heart.

Many Americans are suspicious of the Federal Reserve, ascribing all sorts of monetary disasters and evil motives to it. But what a surprise when WND revealed that none other than Ben Bernanke himself, the Fed’s current chairman, explicitly admits that the Federal Reserve caused the worst financial disaster in U.S. history – the Great Depression.

WND was the first to reveal how a new plan by a California lawmaker would allow schools to be used to promote the overthrow of the U.S. government, and let teachers in public district classrooms “inculcate in the mind of any pupil a preference for communism,” according to a traditional values advocacy organization.

A Second Amendment advocacy organization asked the Bush administration to withdraw a legal brief that leaders fear could be used to support “any gun ban – no matter how sweeping,” as long as some court somewhere determines it is “reasonable.”

A family in western Colorado was stunned when nearly a dozen members of a police SWAT team punched a hole in their front door and invaded their home with guns drawn, demanding their son go to the hospital after suffering an accidental fall.

A California proposal granted power authorities control of home temperatures while denying consumers ability to override settings during “emergency events.” Thermostats equipped with a radio communication microchips were to be installed in every newly constructed home. In less than one week following WND’s report, the California Energy Commission made the program purely voluntary and dropped mandatory requirements.

Groundbreaking scientific research reported by WND revealed a possible link between Morgellons disease – a disfiguring illness that can make sufferers believe worms are crawling under their skin – and a type of bacteria called Agrobacterium used in genetic engineering of plants and causing tumors in vegetation.

WND led the U.S. media coverage of photographic evidence in Pakistan showing Benazir Bhutto was assassinated by a gunman close to the car she was in.

A video of the assassination of Benazir Bhutto provides additional visual evidence the former prime minister was killed by pistol shots fired by an assailant in the crowd, fueling suspicions President Musharraf has engineered a cover-up to hide government involvement in the political killing.

Mounting video evidence in the probe of the assassination of Benazir Bhutto has forced the Pakistani government to and ask Scotland Yard to investigate, while critics tie the murder weapon to the army’s Special Services Group, WND reported.

Robert Pastor – the American University professor whose writings have championed the creation of a North American Community – has resigned his position in the school’s Office of International Affairs amid a reorganization that has dismantled many of his key programs, WND reported.

As WND reported, the Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee, or GATA, claims the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Treasury are surreptitiously manipulating the country’s gold reserves by participating in undisclosed leases, according to an advance copy WND obtained of the ad running in the Wall Street Journal. And U.S. central banks may have less than half the gold they claim to possess in their vaults, charges a watchdog group.

A scientific study of the hydrogen-rich fluids venting at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean in the Lost City Hydrothermal Field presents new evidence supporting the abiotic theory for the origin of oil, which asserts oil is a natural product the Earth that generates constantly rather than a “fossil fuel” derived from decaying ancient forests and dead dinosaurs.

Critics say a plan to lease the N.J. Parkway mirrors the NAFTA superhighway plan. New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, a Democrat, is proposing a variation of the “public-private partnerships,” being implemented in other parts of the country and according to critics a danger to the sovereignty of the U.S., as a solution for the state’s expected $3 billion budget deficit, the biggest after California and New York.

The International Monetary Fund says it plans to sell gold from its reserves, and the announcement at the Group of Seven (G7) meeting in Tokyo confirmed those moves could come as early as April, WND was first to report.

President Bush has admonished those attending a meeting of Conservative Political Action Committees that conservatives should support the Republican Party’s nominee, an apparent signal by the GOP establishment that those in the “big tent” should support Sen. John McCain as the presumptive winner of the party’s presidential nomination.

An expert is warning that Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign could be vulnerable to concerns over reports of influence peddling that have been dogging the senator for years.

New data: Maybe oil isn’t from dead dinos – WND reports on new scientific data from Saturn’s moon Titan which indicates more hydrocarbons than all of Earth’s known reserves.

A new report from the Federal Reserve has confirmed the non-borrowed reserves of U.S. banks plummeted to a negative $18 billion at a recent accounting, reflecting an apparently worsening situation from the negative $8.8 billion reported at the end of January.

An investigative author says George Soros used Sen. John McCain to push for limits on issue advertising by grass-roots groups because he was upset over the cataclysmic failure of Hillarycare, the all-encompassing government health care program proposed during Bill Clinton’s first term as president. The author told WND that Soros later funded the senator’s Reform Institute because of their work together on the McCain-Feingold Act.

John McCain has asserted his opposition to Russian President Vladimir Putin a number of times, however, his opposition, is being called into question by links that have been established in various reports between McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis, and Ukrainian billionaire Oleg Deripaska, who is suspected of having ties to organized Russian crime.

In a ceremony that received virtually no attention in the American media, the United States and Canada signed a military agreement allowing the armed forces from one nation to support the armed forces of the other nation during a domestic civil emergency, even one that does not involve a cross-border crisis.

John McCain’s personal fortune traces back to organized crime in Arizona, through his father-in-law, according to a report published by a multi-news agency team called Investigative Reporters and Editors Inc.

A video clip widely circulated on the Internet shows a test that pulverized an F-4 fighter on impact with a hardened target, providing evidence to answer 9/11 skeptics who question why so little identifiable airplane debris remained after the hijacked American Airlines Boeing 757 hit the Pentagon.

Sen. John McCain has enjoyed strong support from a lobbyist group that backs the Kosovo Liberation Army despite allegations the KLA is a Muslim terrorist group with ties to criminal drug networks and al-Qaida.

Global warming is a natural process, not likely the result of human activities, argued more than 100 internationally prominent environmental scientists in papers presented at the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change, which was held in New York City.

The controversial Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, or SPP, continues closed-door meetings with business leaders while the heads of state of the U.S., Mexico and Canada now openly urge them to launch a public relations campaign to counter growing criticism of the trilateral cooperative some fear is a step toward a North American Union.

Mexican truck drivers allowed to travel throughout the U.S. under a Bush administration demonstration project may not be proficient in English. In fact, the head of the Department of Transportation admitted to a senate panel that Mexican drivers were being designated at the border as “proficient in English” even though they could explain U.S. traffic signs only in Spanish.

Unemployment rates are rising across the United States, except in Oklahoma. That state is experiencing the most dramatic reduction in unemployment since 2007, an improvement many in Oklahoma attribute to the passage last year by the state legislature of a strong employment-focused immigration reform law.